Amid a wave of rhino and elephant killings across the country, the shooting of the rhino in the heavily guarded Nairobi park --the headquarters of the government's Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS)--illustrates how easily poachers are decimating the country's large animals. "Nairobi National Park is one of the best protected areas, so it is a really shocking thing for us," KWS spokesman Paul Udoto told AFP.

POLICE in the Zambezi Region are investigating smuggling of cut ivory that was discovered on a bus on Sunday at Kongola village near the Kwando River.Deputy Commissioner Rudolf Kanyetu, who is the regional crime investigation coordinator, said the trophies were discovered in the luggage of an unknown passenger.

Police say the passengers and the driver, remained tight-lipped after a series of interrogations and as a result they could not make any arrests....

You rarely hear folks praise nuclear radiation these days, but Kevin Uno—a postdoctoral research scientist at Columbia University who has a bone to pick with ivory poachers—is doing just that. After World War II, when the U.S. and the Soviet Union started testing nuclear weapons, the atmospheric levels of an unstable isotope known as carbon 14 shot up dramatically, peaking in the mid-’60s, and then fell steadily in a pattern known as the “bomb curve.” Carbon 14 is the same isotope that has been used in carbon dating techniques for years, but with this bomb curve—linked to historical records—the ages of plants and animals that died within the last 60 or so years can now be estimated with greater accuracy. With poaching on the rise in recent years and criminals claiming that they’re selling ivory only from elephants hunted years ago, Uno hopes to use his bomb-curve dating technique to determine the real age of elephant tusks and catch the traffickers in the act. Here’s how he’ll do it....

Paratroopers in Kenya to train local rangers who are battling against increasingly militarised poachers...

The British army is, for the first time in many years, taking a key role against the escalating illegal wildlife trade killing rhinos and elephants inAfrica.

A total of 25 paratroopers in Kenya are on rotation at the army's base in Nanyuki, 200km north of Nairobi, and will provide training to Kenyan rangers who are battling increasingly militarised poachers....

Speaking at an environmental crime forum here Wednesday, Muigai also called on Kenya's Parliament to urgently enact the new Wildlife Act which will impose stiffer penalties against poachers.

Faced with a sharp rise in cases of elephant and rhino poaching, the Kenyan government formed an Elite Inter-Agency Anti-Poaching Unit composed of 121 officers to patrol the country's national parks and reserves.

The government's resolve to contain poaching appears as strong as ever with plans to further strengthen the elite unit underway.

Muigai, who was addressing an environmental crime forum at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) headquarters here, called for stiffer penalties for those convicted of wildlife crimes saying that more than 90 elephants have been reported killed this year alone.

Stakeholders in the fight against environmental crime called for co-ordinated efforts to deter such acts.

Environmental crime ranges from poaching, illegal trade on protected tree species and fishing among others.

By Megan Gannon, LiveScience News Editor: Poaching and habitat loss may be putting elephants at risk of losing their culture — the learned behaviors that seem to be passed down from generation to generation, researchers say....

Poaching and habitat loss may be putting elephants at risk of losing their culture — the learned behaviors that seem to be passed down from generation to generation, researchers say. What's more, the trauma of separation and displacement may have lasting psychological impacts on the creatures resembling post-traumatic stress disorder in humans, according to a new study....

Pangolins are among the oddest and least-familiar animals on Earth. They’re mammals, but they're armor-plated. Their chief defensive posture is to tuck their heads under their tails and roll up, like a basketball crossed with an artichoke. (It works: Even lions generally can’t get a grip.) They have tongues that are not only coated with a sticky, fly paper–like substance but can also extend up to 16 inches to probe into nests and snag ants for dinner. They’re shy, nocturnal and live either high up trees or deep underground....

Interesting perspective... "Whether you swig ground-up rhino horn or mount the rhino's entire head on a wall, both represent a show of wealth and status in different cultures. The question is which of these, if any, is more legitimate." Fiona Gordon

At the offices of the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Northern Kenya, a terrible hush descends when news filters through that poachers have slaughtered yet another rhino....

Lewa was a safe haven for the rhino, which had lost none between 1983 and 2009. Now 11 have been poached since the beginning of 2012.

The 26-year rapprochement ended with the slaughter of three rhino in 2010 and 2011, and the aim to save and increase Lewa's herd of 62 white and 60 black rhino (which is listed by the World Wildlife Fund as critically endangered) was placed under threat.

There are less than 5,000 left in the whole of Kenya and worldwide, one rhino is poached every 11 hours....

Horses are an essential part of effective law enforcement and anti-poaching tactics at Zakouma National Park in the Republic of Chad. Since African Parks took over the management of the park in 2010, horse management has undergone significant improvements in terms of horse care, equipment training and guard horsemanship - and continues to do so. Stables, a riding arena, a lunging ring and two camps for the stallions when they are off-duty have also been set up....

By September 30, 2013 seven hundred and four South African rhinos were poached, eclipsing 2012s record of 688. My colleagues now predict that over 1,000 majestic rhinos will be butchered for their horns next year (2014). At this crazed rate: Rhinos will be extinct by 2022.

Over the past 113 years the human population has soared from 1.6 to 7.1 billion. Rhinonumbers, on the other hand, have plummeted from 500,000 to 29,000, a 95 percent decrease. And worse, since 2007 poaching rhinos have increased by 5,000 percent.

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